Eighth Quadrennial Conference of the SSCLE in Cáceres, Spain

Monday
June 25 - Friday June 29, 2012

In the general assembly of the
SSCLE which took place in Cáceres on Friday 29th June, Luis specified
the requirements which papers to be published in the proceedings should have.
Let us remind you now about them:

-Only participants who selected the
‘Proceedings’ option in the Registration Form and paid the 30 euros fee can submit
their paper for publication.

-The style sheet will be that of our review
‘Crusades’. Those papers which do not conform to these norms will be returned
to authors for correction. In case that they do not, the article will be
rejected.

-The length of the paper should be 7.000 words
including footnotes. If any paper exceeds that number, it will be sent back to
the author for readjustment. It is very important that the extension keeps
within those limits. There are about 50 papers, and the systematic breaking of
the maximum length would imply more than one volume. We cannot obviously afford
that. If any author eventually refuses to shorten the paper, his/her
contribution will not be published.

-The papers will have to be submitted in Word,
and the images in TIFF.format. Other programmes or formats will not be
accepted.

-Maps, plans, diagrams and above all pictures should
be highly selective (maximum number per paper five) and always black and white.
They increase the cost of the publication immensely. These items should be sent
separately from the text.

-One printed proof will be sent to authors in
September 2013. It will have to be sent back to the above mentioned e-mail
address within a month.

-If everything runs as programmed, the book
will come out in early 2014.

-All these arrangements are dependent on Professor
Manuel Rojas continuing as head of Extremadura University Press.

With
our very best wishes to you all for the summer,

Luis
García-Guijarro,Secretary
of the SSCLE

Manuel
Rojas,Assistant
Secretary of the SSCLE

Madrid-Cáceres, July 9th
2012

Dear members and participants in
the conference,

A preliminary estimation of
income and expenses related to the Eighth Quadrennial conference of the SSCLE
was circulated among you all in the general assembly of the SSCLE which took
place at the ‘Complejo San Francisco’ in Cáceres on the evening of Friday 29th
June. New unexpected expenses have appeared which distort an already very tight
budget. They show that a few members did not understand the circumstances in
which the conference took place and did not act in the austere way that those
circumstances required. As a result the extra expenses have put the organizers
in a very difficult position, although we hope that negotiations with the hotel
Quinto Centenario and with the restaurant Los Golfines will lead to a
successful agreement.

Apart from other minutiae, two of
the most significant examples of extra expenses are the following:

400 euros on photocopies at the Hotel Quinto
Centenario. We had warned all participants in a letter which was sent a few
days before the conference started, and which was also included in the
conference material, that for financial reasons the sessions would take place
in a private, not in an academic or institutional environment. Those participants
who wished to distribute copies could well either have brought them themselves
or sent the originals in advance, so that Manuel and I could have photocopied
them at no cost in our own universities. What might be perhaps considered a
careless attitude of some members has generated a significant debt.

The farewell dinner menu which we had
arranged with the Restaurant Los Golfines included 37 bottles of wine which amounted
to almost a bottle per person, mainly taking into account that quite a few participants
did not drink wine for dietetic or cultural reasons. To our great distress the
restaurant informed us a few days ago that an extra of 22 bottles of wine were
consumed. We honestly find the behaviour of a few members unbelievable to
express it softly. The merry disposition of some participants will cost an
extra of 300 euros, though we hope to reduce that sum with a bit of luck.

The
behaviour of a few has not only caused even more financial problems to the
organization of the conference, but offered a deplorable image of the Society
to people who have nothing to do with the academic milieu. For instance,
waiters and management at the hotel were shocked at some people snatching food
at the coffee breaks and hiding it in napkins to take it away. Not to mention
some odious despotic behaviour towards hotel personnel who were going well over
their duty to satisfy all of us. From our point of view some participants have
taken extreme kindness for servitude.

As it
could not be otherwise, most of the members who participated in the conference
have of course nothing to do with the above mentioned incidents, and so the
comments do not affect them in the least. But we feel that, as a mature group
of scholars, all participants should know what has happened, and how the
behaviour of a few affects the whole lot and the reputation of the SSCLE.

These
incidents do not touch at all on our happiness and deep satisfaction at having met
you in Cáceres, a part of Spain many of you had not probably been to. We are
also glad at the quality of the papers and at the sociability which favoured
contacts. As I publicly told those participants who were present at the general
meeting, Manuel and I had nothing to do with it. You were the ones who created
the right intellectual and social atmosphere to make the conference a success.
As organizers of this intellectual gathering, we are immensely grateful to you
all.

We wish
you a lovely summer and hope to meet most of you in a not too distant future,

Luis
García-Guijarro,Secretary
of the SSCLE

Manuel
Rojas,Asisstant
Secretary of the SSCLE

Huesca, June 10th 2012

Dear
members and participants,

The
time of the society’s conference has almost arrived and we are much looking
forward to meeting you either at Madrid Barajas airport or straight in Cáceres
in roughly a couple of weeks. We have unfortunately been forced to make some
changes on the original plans due to the present severe economic and financial
crisis, and mainly due to the small number of participants, only around 70.
This fact has seriously upset our planning which was based on the reasonable
amount of about 120 members attending the conference; these were the Avignon
numbers. After much struggling, we have managed to keep the budget straight,
but some small variations have been necessary. All participants who have chosen the accommodation suggested by the
organizers in the Registration Form will be concentrated in one hotel, the
Hotel Barceló Quinto Centenario. Otherwise the cost per person would have
been much higher, because the extremely favourable offers we were given by the
two hotels were submitted to the condition of booking 60 rooms at each of them.
It is obvious that we can only use one of the two if we wish to stick, as we do,
to the set of prices included in the Registration Form which reached members in
early December 2011.

The
second change affects the place of sessions. We would have difficulties in
getting a huge reconverted fifteenth century Franciscan convent for free, as it
was planned, if we are only going to occupy one or two conference rooms. When
we originally approached more than a year ago the regional government to which
this monument belongs (the University of Extremadura has no control over it),
they were helpful and willing to offer the convent with no charges. At the
beginning of May they told us instead that we would have to pay 1000 euros for
the use of the complex daily, and this amount does not include coffee breaks.
Under such circumstances the conference would not have been financially
feasible. So we have been forced to
transfer the sessions to the Hotel Quinto Centenario, which has been by the way
extremely helpful in this respect. The ‘Complejo San Francisco’ will just be
used for the opening and closing of the conference on the evenings of Monday
June 25th and Friday June 29th. After much discussion
with politicians and managers we have succeeded in getting a big conference
room for free.

This
obviously affects the amount of money many of you have already paid, mainly
when you have done so including internal transport in Cáceres. We will calculate
the cost of using the buses only two days, on Monday and on Friday, and also
the different room prices when that is case. We shall obviously reimburse you during
the conference the money which is due.

We
are extremely sorry that all this has happened, and also apologize for the
inconveniences these changes may cause you. But, please, be sure that the above
mentioned alternatives are the only possible ones. Without these drastic last
minute changes the conference would have had to be cancelled, because we could
not have coped with the huge cost unless the registration fee were increased to
prohibitive levels, a step that has never crossed our minds.